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ShoreTel Brings Enterprise Communications to Apple Watch

The company's ShoreTel Mobility for Apple Watch app will bring UC capabilities to the device when it hits the stores later this month.

ShoreTel is bringing enterprise communications to the Apple Watch.

When the wearable device becomes available in stores April 24, among the many consumer-focused apps that will be available on the Apple Watch will be an enterprise-focused ShoreTel Mobility unified communications (UC) app.

According to ShoreTel officials, Apple Watch users will be able to access their corporate UC applications via the device, enabling them to answer or reject incoming calls, view and respond to corporate instant messages, redial missed calls, call a contact on a "favorites list" and join conference calls without the need for extra bridging or authentication.

The new app, ShoreTel Mobility for Apple Watch, continues the evolution of the company's UC technology from an on-premises offering to one that can also run in the cloud. That evolution is set to continue later this month, when ShoreTel executives are expected to roll out the vendor's common communications platform, which they said will give users a true hybrid UC environment by enabling them to access the same services via the cloud or on-premises technology.

It's also part of a push by ShoreTel officials around personal UC, with communications capabilities available to anyone from any device at any time and from anywhere. With workforces becoming increasingly mobile and using an increasingly broad range of devices—from smartphones to tablets to, now, wearable technology—employees are demanding the ability to collaborate from wherever they are and on whatever device they're using.

ShoreTel officials point to research and a white paper done by Zeus Kerravala, principal analyst with ZK Research, validating the idea of personal UC.

"While the immediate benefit may be in each worker to be more productive, [personal UC] has a range of benefits that extend beyond the individual," Chandler Harris, content marketing manager at ShoreTel, said in a post on the company blog.

Those beneficiaries also include businesses (improved customer service and greater business intelligence), executives (faster time to market and greater business agility) and the IT organization (simplified operations and faster deployment times), Harris wrote.